[mmmadog]

Seems easy enough. I have a Schiit Valhalla amp and would like to go balanced to my HP's but don't want to spend the money on another amp. Maybe I'm completely off base on it being easy to modify.

 

[cossix]

You'd have to rewire it completely. Balanced outputs are only beneficial if the amp has both balanced and single ended but skimped on single ended part. I wouldn't worry about messing with your Valhalla because you won't get better sound quality by rewiring it. Either buy a Jotunheim (the balanced out on that is better quality than the SE out and puts out way more power) or stick to SE.

 

[mmmadog]

That was going to be my other question. Why do most amps put out more power balanced than se. Some amps it's a lot more

 

[cossix]

That was going to be my other question. Why do most amps put out more power balanced than se. Some amps it's a lot more

I think it comes down to how the two amps work with the given circuit. There is also much debate about how balanced is actually worse because it introduces at least twice the distortion than SE because of the circuit design. Of course the distortion will be inaudible on decent amps but it still is technically worse for accurate sound, just like how anything above 16bit 44.1khz physically distorts more than that sample rate and bit depth, which is fact by the way but it all comes down to being able to hear it. Which nobody can because it's such a small amount.

So theoretically, balanced is worse for accurate sound than a similar SE circuit, BUT that doesn't mean there aren't great balanced amps out there. For example, the Jotunheim is amazing. But I wouldnt convert any SE amp to balanced because you won't get a benefit.

 

[buke9]

Making a single ended amp a balanced amp will not be a small task and not lend itself to good results unless your very familiar with the amp topology and know what the amp makers did with the circuits beyond what they said they did. I don’t have the depth of knowledge to do this myself but pretty sure you would have to totally rewire a Valhalla 2 and add I don’t know what to make that happen. You have to ask yourself why didn’t they make it a balanced amp? If they could of why didn’t they? Not for sure but have not seen a balanced OTL amp they might be out there but haven’t seen it. Not a lot of balanced tube amps to be sure and the ones I’ve seen are not cheap. If you can do it I will be very interested.

 

[Dulalala]

That was going to be my other question. Why do most amps put out more power balanced than se. Some amps it's a lot more

To make it simple, in a balanced amp you have two "amp" inside. Left and right are amped separately, hence more total power.

 

[ProtegeManiac]

Seems easy enough. I have a Schiit Valhalla amp and would like to go balanced to my HP's but don't want to spend the money on another amp. Maybe I'm completely off base on it being easy to modify.

What made you think that was easy? Differential drive is like having two SE amp circuits, only difference from running dual mono is that it can run off a single power supply, but basically where an SE amp runs R+, L-, and shared GND, one of that will run R+ and R-, then the other runs L+ and L-. No shared GND.

You can't just convert the Valhalla to do that. At minimum you'll need to gut two Valhallas, modify the input stage so each one runs + and - on each channel, graft them into a single chassis and work out how to handle power delivery (you have two Valhallas, you might as well use dual mono config), and then figure out a way to control the preamp stage on both amp circuits (some dual mono and balanced drive amps use some kind of mechanical connection to both amps but most since they're designed from the start as such use a single pot wired to both sides).